Frank_ The Voice - James Kaplan [213]
Eccles filed a criminal complaint against Sinatra, but withdrew it when he received a letter of apology allegedly written by Frank.
Some good news after he got home put Frank in a better mood: Nancy announced she would permit him to file for a divorce in Nevada, where the complainant had only to satisfy a six-week residency requirement. Broker than ever, Sinatra had his people get him what work they could: two weeks at the Riverside Hotel in Reno, followed by another couple of weeks at the Desert Inn in Las Vegas.
He arrived in Reno on August 9 in fine spirits—and determined not to let any bad press scuttle his plans. Frank smiled at the reporters and said, “I hope I’m going to get along with you fellows.” Then he shook hands with each, and invited them all to his hotel suite to ask him whatever they wanted. The men glanced at each other in disbelief.
Soon they were cozily swilling free booze and noshing on canapés in Sinatra’s suite at the Riverside. They got out their notebooks.
“Frank,” one of them piped up, “I’m sorry to have to ask you this, but some people are saying you’re too broke to file for divorce.”
Frank looked at the ceiling, exhaled a plume of smoke, and leaned back in his chair like a man without a care in the world. Outside the picture windows, the snowcapped Sierra Nevada stretched gloriously across the horizon. He grinned at the reporters. Was that what they were saying? Well, the gentlemen of the press would all be getting their bill for the drinks and snacks in a few minutes.
Everyone laughed. Frank turned serious. He didn’t like to brag, but this joint was paying him twenty-five grand for two weeks, which wasn’t too shabby, plus he had another engagement in Vegas after that, and his television show—Saturday evenings from eight to nine on CBS—would start its second season in October. Frank guessed he had a couple of nickels to rub together.
Someone piped up: Was he going to marry Miss Gardner?
Frank looked at his fingernails. “I presume I will.”
Another voice called out. What about all that trouble down in Mexico?
Sinatra shook his head. “Grossly exaggerated,” he said. “I got sore because I got some pretty rough handling from a couple of guys. They were the exception to the rule, though, for the press has done a lot for me.”
Frank gave a small, sincere smile. Butter wouldn’t have melted in his mouth.
Ten days later Ava flew up to Reno. Continuing the charm offensive, Frank escorted her into another roomful of reporters, grinning like the cat that ate the canary. For reasons of his own, he had spent the last week and a half growing a sparse mustache. He would try facial hair from time to time over the years. It was not a good look for him.
But his skin was tan, his eyes were the blue of the high-desert sky, and he and the press were still romancing each other. He didn’t even flinch when somebody asked if he knew what Nancy’s plans were.
“I honestly don’t know what she’ll do,” Sinatra said. He looked meltingly at Ava. “But I think you can safely say that Miss Gardner and I will be married.”
Over dinner one night—they were relaxing at the Cal Neva Lodge, on the glorious shore of Lake Tahoe—he asked her to tell him about the bullfighter. Had they done it? She artfully changed the subject, smiling brightly; he smiled back at her, then asked again over coffee. She gave him a cross look and asked him why he was trying to fuck everything up. They fought; they made up. Later, they lay together quietly in the bedroom of his cabin: with the wind swishing through the pines, it seemed they could hear the earth turning. And he asked her again.
She got up on one elbow and looked down at him, her hair falling over one eye. Didn’t they have better things to discuss than this?
It was no big deal, he swore; he just wanted to know.
She shook a cigarette out of the